With the US mint soon to stop minting pennies, do you think semi key and key date wheat cents will go up in value or stay the same? Do you think that there will be a greater, lesser, or same focus on collecting pennies (collecting, not hoarding)? Do you think common wheat pennies will stay the same at around 3-5 cents apiece?
I think so. When we changed from the memorial reverse to the shield reverse I expected that memorial cents would be gobbled up like my generation gobbled up wheat cents when I was young, but it never happened. I suspect the Lincoln cent market will remain about the same in the foreseeable future.
I've heard that the mint has a big stockpile of cent planchets. The coin will no longer be made for circulation, but it will be included in Mint and Proof sets. If the stockpile is big enough, it could last for a long time. Frankly if this is true, I'm all for it. The cent is the only collector coin with a virtually complete date run from 1793 to present. Only the 1815 is missing.
